Steve is a process engineer at Tilgetti Brothers. He has been with the company for $2$ years. He loves his job. He works with a team of engineers that have a lot of experience. He has learned so much from them. They do pick on him and give him a lot of the more intricate projects they don$$t want to do$.$ He figures it$$s because he$$s the new guy...even still after $2$ years. He can take it; the guys love him. He$$s just paying his dues, right?

Steve hasn$$t gotten a real raise in a couple years. He has gotten the usual $2\%-3\%.$ And he suspects that other members of his team make almost double his salary. It doesn$$t feel fair to him since he does a huge portion of the work as the $$new guy$.$ He feels that he is a good team member.

One late afternoon after a meeting with his team one of the guys let it slip that he got a $20\%$ raise last year. Steve was furious. How are these guys getting better raises than him? I need to talk to John tomorrow.

John is the Engineering Director at Tilget Brothers. He likes his job. He never wanted to become the guy in charge but it was the next step. John has been with Tilget for $17$ years. If it was up to him, he would have stayed on the Process Engineering team. Those guys are just the best. They work so well together. Although to him, the new guy Steve is a little odd. According to some of John$$s buddies on the team, Steve screws up a lot. John feels bad that he hasn$$t been able to spend much time with Steve. In his mind, Steve will come around. His team will just take care of it$.$ That$$s how he learned the job, from the other folks on the team.

John just received an email from Steve. He wants to meet with tomorrow. What could Steve want to meet about?

Steve stayed up late preparing to meet with John. Right now, Steve makes $$55,000/$year$.$ His average raises have been $2\%-3\%$ percent per year. If he had to estimate the average salary on his team it was probably $$68$K$-$$$90$K$/$per year. And his one team member got a $20\%$ raise last year!! Steve said out loud $$I am going to ask for $$75$K with a $10\%$ raise for this year. I am tired of being Steve the NEW GUY!$$